New Every Morning

I'm not sure I have ever been as excited and hopeful for a new year to begin as I was this year. This December 31st, I was so ready to enter a new phase and apply all of the things I learned last year. I was pumped. It was going to be great. 2009- here I come.

Well, it's one week into the new year and I have already failed professionally (Oh, did I say I would go to EVERY audition avaliable to me?), personally (As I sip from a Starbucks right NOW knowing I had vowed to spend less money there.) and spiritually (Maybe if I just apply the odd numbers of what I learned on my list from 2008?)

Thank goodness I can always rest in the knowledge that I am a PLMF- a Perfectly Loved Moral Failure. And thank goodness, God's mercies are new and avaliable to me not on a yearly basis but on a daily basis:

"This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is Thy faithfulness."- Lamentations 3:21-23

In Kentucky, I heard a sermon by Pastor Kyle McDanell on the passage where Jesus is washing His disciples feet. The passage starts with Peter saying he does not want his feet to be washed by his Savior:

"'No,' said Peter, 'you shall never wash my feet.'

Jesus answered, 'Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.'
'Then, Lord,' Simon Peter replied, 'not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!'
Jesus answered, 'A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean...'" John 13:8-10a

Pastor McDanell pointed out that Peter had been saved and spiritually speaking he had"been bathed." He didn't need to have his hands, head, body, etc. washed. But even though he was clean before God's eyes, he still had to have Jesus wash the dirt off his feet. And the pastor pointed out that we all need our feet washed multiple times a day, just like people in Jesus time needed their feet washed literally multiple times a day as they walked on dirty roads in their sandals. They didn't need their whole bodies cleaned, but they needed to wash the dirt of the world off of their feet over and over.

As 2009 begins, I am a Perfectly Loved Moral Failure. God looks on me perfectly because I am covered by Jesus sacrifice. I don't need a bath. (Well I might but not figuratively ;-)

But I am a moral failure, and I must keep coming to Jesus, spending time with Jesus, pressing in to Jesus to get my feet washed.... to get the dust off.... the junk... the dirt of this world. And I will have to keep doing that every moment of every day for the rest of my life, until I see Jesus face to face.

Thank God his mercies are new every morning. Thank God Jesus not only died for me, but He is perfect in humility to invite me to draw near to Him so He can also wash my feet.

Some Lyrics from "Great is Thy Faithfulness":

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!

Morning by morning new mercies I see.

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Praise God that I do not have to wait until 2010 to get my feet washed again by His merciful hands. Whenever I spend time in His presence, He will show up and if I ask, He will take away the my dirt and make me clean again.

(P.S. The VanGogh exhibit was in town at the MOMA last week. I think the sun is probably setting in this picture... but you know, we can pretend it's morning, right?)

UPDATE 1/13/09: Thanks to Grace for adding the term PLMF to Urban Dictionary:

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=PLMF
So funny.